Currently retified policies in india and maharashtra
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The Maharashtra government has just announced that the cabinet has approved the reservation demand of the Maratha community. The demand which was articulated in the form of massive silent marches since 2015 and even led to some suicides, was resurrected soon after the rape of a minor in Ahmednagar. The previous Congress government had tried to provide reservation to the community, but the proposal was struck down by the high court. For the BJP now, it is now being seen as a political masterstroke. Members of the government have already started taking credit saying that despite having a non-Maratha CM, the party has delivered on the promise of reservation.
The state in a bid to avoid the pitfall of the earlier ordinance, formed a panel under the backward class commission that judged the community under 25 parameters before declaring that it was fit to be called backward. The three recommendations of the panel were: 1. The Community was fit to be called economically and socially backward and that it had less representation in relevant walks of life, 2. Under article 15(4) the state could provide reservation to communities that are socially and economically backward and the community did fall under this category, and 3. That there was extraordinary circumstance as mentioned in the Supreme court ruling which put a cap of 50% on reservation, to go over and above the prescribed limit. When quizzed, Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis said that the extraordinary circumstance in this case was that giving the community reservation under the existing framework would have taken away from the other communities already in the framework and been unjust to the community also. Therefore the state has created a new category called SEBC (Socially and Economically Backward Class). Whether any communities other than Marathas, can be added to this new category in the future is yet unclear.